History of Television

776 Words2 Pages
bulb-icon

Recommended: History and development of television

History of Television

Television has become a major industry all over the world, especially in the industrialized nations, and a major medium of communication and source of home entertainment. Television is used in many industries. A few examples are for surveillance in places inaccessible to or dangerous for human beings, in science for tissue microscopy, and in education. Today you can find a television in almost every home. This is why I decided to research the history of the television.

The first television devices were based on an 1884 invention called the scanning disk, patented by Paul Nipkow. This device was a large disk with holes on it, which spun in front of an object while a photoelectric cell recorded changes in light. Depending on the electricity transmitted by the photoelectric cell, an array of light bulbs would glow or remain dark. But Nipkow’s mechanical system could not scan and deliver a clear, live-action image. Many inventors hoped to perfect this.

In 1921, a 14-year-old Mormon from Idaho named Philo Farnsworth came up with an idea. While mowing hay in rows, Philo realized an electron beam could scan a picture in horizontal lines, reproducing the image almost instantaneously. Philo was not the only one with this idea. At the same time, Russian immigrant Vladimir Zworykin had also designed a camera that focused an image through a lens onto an array of photoelectric cells coating the end of a tube. The electrical image formed by ...

Show More
Related

  • Technicolor Research Topic Report: Sound and Image.

    2168 Words  | 5 Pages

    There first invention produced was the Technicolor System 1 Additive Color, which I’m sorry to say flopped massively due to the unfortunate screening of The Gulf Between in 1917 which only a few frames remain of this film today. This was the first public premier of the technology and was disastrous. The film was captured through two separate filters red and green and the light through those two filters was captured on a single reel of film, when processed this negative had red and green information captured on a black and white reel, when this was processed the reel was placed into a projector and then threw red and green filters. To project the image an adjustable prism that had to manually lined up by the projectionist as two separate images formed on the projection screen this did not work as planned as the projectionist failed to line up the images correctly.

    Read More

  • Television Today Versus the 1950s

    1195 Words  | 3 Pages

    How many people today watch family sitcoms to imitate or compare values with their own? Probably not as many as there were in the 1950s. In Stephanie Coontz's "What We Really Miss about the 1950s", she discusses why people feel more nostalgic towards growing up in the 1950s, and how she disagrees that 1950s wasn't the decade that we really should like or remember best. Apart from economic stability, family values played an important part then. Through television sitcoms, such as "Leave it to Beaver", "Father knows Best", families watched them to make sure they were living correctly. It was like guidance and somewhat reassurance. However, values of families have changed, and this is shown on sitcoms today. We watch sitcoms today for entertainment, and sometimes we can relate to them because the setting is realistic. In the modern sitcom, "Gilmore Girls" characters and plot are used to demonstrate family values such as gender roles, children roles, economic status, morals, ethics and general organization of a family that differ from the values shown in the 1950s sitcoms.

    Read More

  • Television in the Fifties

    1098 Words  | 3 Pages

    Technology in the 1950s started with many great innovations that shape the way we live now. Probably the most important innovation of television was the introduction of cable T.V., television broadcasting, sitcoms and talk shows. Television went though many changes in its younger years. The way T.V. Developed in the early years is the foundation for what we watched now days. Transitory radios became very popular in the fact that Music could be heard in any location because it was now portable. Still T.V. Innovations were what the 1950s were all about from a technology and the birth of the T.V. show.

    Read More

  • The Impact of Television on Rock n’ Roll

    1375 Words  | 3 Pages

    Before analyzing the history of Rock n’ Roll television, the history of how watching television came to become a popular must come into question. To summarize briefly, the invention of television was in development since the 1870s, however the first demonstration of live transmitted images in motion was in 1925 lead by Scottish inventor John Logie Baird (Radio Shows Far Away Objects in Motion). The image was of Baird’s business partner Oliver Hutchinson (Television), showing a mere five frames per second, it was an impressive sight for the time. With perfection of the invention, electronic televisions had been developed by Vladimir Kosma Zworykin with the help of the RCA radio...

    Read More

  • General Overview of Chapter 11: The Huxleyan Warning

    676 Words  | 2 Pages

    The many evils that exist within television’s culture were not foreseen back when televisions were first put onto the market. Yet, Postman discovers this very unforgiveable that the world did not prepare itself to deal with the ways that television inherently changes our ways of communication. For example, people who lived during the year 1905, could not really predict that the invention of a car would not make it seem like only a luxurious invention, but also that the invention of the car would strongly affect the way we make decisions.

    Read More

  • Postwar America: The Golden Age of Television

    1253 Words  | 3 Pages

    The ‘Golden Age of Television’ is what many refer to as the period between the 1950s and 60s when the television began to establish itself as a prevalent medium in the United States. In 1947, the American Broadcasting Company (ABC), Columbia Broadcasting System (CBS), the National Broadcasting Company (NBC), and the Du Mont Network were the four main television networks that ran stations with regular programming taking place. (Television, 2003) While regular television programming was a new innovation, the television itself had been commercially available for over twenty years prior to the 50s. It was conceived by many worldly innovators and went through several testing stages before it was finally completed in the late twenties. The three main innovators were Niplow - who first developed a rotating disk with small holes arranged in a spiral pattern in 1884, Zworykin - who developed the Iconoscope which could scan pictures and break them into electronic signals (a primitive form of the Cathode Ray Tube) in 1923, and lastly Fansworth - who demonstrated for the first time that it was possible to transmit an electrical image in 1927. (Rollo, 2011) However, one of the many reasons why this medium was successful in the 50s was due to the fact that it became more accessible to the public. Television sets were more affordable to middle class citizens which created further interest in the new technology. Through an historical account of the medium, the spread of television across America throughout this particular decade will be examined.

    Read More

  • TV Pop Culture: Cognitive Malignancy or Brainpower?

    1914 Words  | 4 Pages

    Obviously the television isn't a new technological development; it's been around since at least the turn of the 1920’s and was readily available for public sale by the late 1930’s (Stephens). After the Second World War, the television expanded with its introduction into the commercial mainstream, and by 1955 it was estimated that roughly half of all American homes had at least one (Stephens). Although certainly impressive, this statistic would only continue to burgeon throughout the decades with the rise of color TV and cable b...

    Read More

  • History of Film

    1273 Words  | 3 Pages

    My grandfather has always talked about how much movies have changed in such a short amount of time. His favorite movie, E.T.: The Extra-Terrestrial, is an example of how editing and special effects have changed drastically since only 1982 and even from the early 1900s. Watching a movie from this year compared to a movie from the 1930s, the viewer would notice many differences ranging from effects, transitions and especially quality. When film started in the late 1800s, there was no digital technology to edit films. There have been many contributors in the film industry that have helped evolve film to its digital age of today. Edwin Porter was the first person in film history to create a narrative film. Lev Kuleshov created a technique gives films certain moods to it and can affect a person’s emotions just by the way images are juxtaposed and edited together. Danny Boyle is an example of a modern day director that developed a set of guidelines that a director should reciprocate while filming. Film editing has revolutionized and developed so much since the early 1900s to now because of important contributors throughout its history that developed new technology and techniques.

    Read More

  • Advantages And Disadvantages Of Watching Too Much Tv

    1074 Words  | 3 Pages

    Before television existed people had to depend on Radio stations to receive their little bit of entertainment and news. But in 1878, the invention of TV began. The first TV made didn’t look anything like the way TV’s look today. It was a mechanical camera with a large spinning disc attached to it (Kids Work). But as over the years, of course, inventions of different TV’s progressed and by the 20th century about 90 percent of our population had a TV in their household (MGHR). Television today is mainly used for people take a break from their life by relaxing and enjoying some entertainment.

    Read More

  • History Of Cable Television

    947 Words  | 2 Pages

    The 1940's and 1950s Cable Television originated in 1948 as a service to households in mountainous or geographically remote areas where reception of over the air television signals was poor. Antennas were erected on mountaintops or other high points, and homes were wired and connected to these towers to receive the broadcast signals.

    Read More

  • Technology and its Impact on American Culture

    1322 Words  | 3 Pages

    Up until 1935, televisions were not electric as they are today. They were mechanical, powered by a small motor with a spinning disc and a neon lamp. The picture projected was very small, sometimes half the size of a business card, and only showed shades of orange and red. From 1935 up until World War II, the electric television was perfected and made ready for public distribution. The electric television provided a much larger, clearer screen with a full range of colors. In 1948-1949, during the post-WWII spending craze, the television became a must-have item for every American family, bringing a world of information and entertainment into living rooms across the country and changing the way Americans viewed many things.

    Read More

  • Muted Group Theory

    2841 Words  | 6 Pages

    Vande Berg, L.R., Wenner, L.A., & Gronbeck, B. E. (1998). Critical Approaches to Television. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company.

    Read More

  • Thomas Edison: The Greatest Inventions That Changed The World

    1390 Words  | 3 Pages

    pen, the practical light bulb, the kinetographic camera, and others such as the phonograph, the

    Read More

  • The History of Entertainment

    1452 Words  | 3 Pages

    Since the dawn of man, entertainment has come shortly after food, water, and shelter on our list of priorities. When the first humans were hunting and gathering in the Great Rift Valley, they passed the time by communicating stories and drawing on cave walls. Not only were these the first forms of entertainment, but were also important in passing down history and cultural values. Many other forms of entertainment can be linked to other aspects of history such as sports, politics, theatre, and art. Entertainment is often the motivation behind history’s greatest spectacles. The Roman Colosseum, one of the 7 Wonders of the World, was built to host huge events that could hold thousands of spectators. Even today’s laptops, computers, and cell phones are used for amusement. But all these inventions stem from one common purpose; entertainment.

    Read More

  • The Negative Effects Of Watching Television

    870 Words  | 2 Pages

    Watching television is one of the most popular pastimes in the world. Almost all children do so; some even take the liberty of slipping out of bed unnoticed at night just to watch a show that they like. However, what most people do not realize is that television can ruin your eyesight, cause lack of concentration and can also inculcate many bad habits, especially in young ones. Discoveries and invention of devices are always welcome till we, humans, find a way to abuse its benefits and be adversely affected by it. This was the case when Wilhelm Roentgen discovered x-ray and within five years, the British Army was using a mobile x-ray unit to locate bullets and shrapnel in wounded soldiers in the Sudan. television was also invented with positive thoughts in mind – there would be no national borders, education and communication would be worldwide, etc.

    Read More

More about History of Television

Open Document